Aging Nixon-haters, mark your calendars! More texts and tapes chronicling the adventures of the old Trickster will be released in about a month.
Nixon tapes are a bit like Tupac albums: They come out regularly, even though the subject is long dead. Or, in the words of our colleague Bob Woodward, they’re “the gift that keeps on giving.”
This new release is expected to be particularly juicy. On Nov. 10, the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Archives will make public for the first time a series of recordings and documents, including the much-anticipated transcript of Nixon’s grand jury testimony in the investigation of the Watergate scandal.
A group of historians sued to make the testimony — which had been redacted under laws that shield grand-jury materials — available to the public.
Stanley Kutler, the historian who led the effort, says the release will finally solve the mystery of what Nixon told the grand jury about the Watergate affair and will provide an unvarnished look at the former president. (Although by now there’s hardly any varnish left.)
“I think this will be Nixon unplugged,” Kutler told our colleague Emily Heil. “Nixon is alone — he has no lawyers, no spin-meisters, no aides. And you don’t lie to a grand jury.”
Says Steven Aftergood, who directs the Project on Government Secrecy for the Federation of American Scientists: “There’s no doubt about its historical interest. It’s also likely to be quite dramatic — it’s not often you get to hear a president under oath answering questions about misconduct.”
Aftergood called it “a missing piece of the puzzle about the end of the Nixon administration.”
The records will be available at the National Archives in College Park and at the Nixon library in Yorba Linda, Calif. Be the first on your block . . .
Lending the farm
Sometimes it’s hard to keep track of all those dimes and nickels. Even harder when your net worth is estimated to be as much as $268 million. So it should come as no surprise that former governor and now presidential candidate Mitt Romney amended his financial disclosure form last week to include a $250,000 to $500,000 loan to The Acres, a horse farm near Los Angeles. The form covers last year and half of this year. The farm is owned by avid rider Ann Romney’s trainer and good friend.
Romney, who recently noted that he, like so many others these days, is unemployed, also reported $15,000 to $50,000 in interest income from the loan. That’ll buy a lot of oats.
Endangered animal
House Republicans say that in the push to trim the federal budget, there are no sacred cows. Or elephants.
Demonstrating just how serious they are about cutting wasteful spending, House Republicans are not just training their sites on easy targets, such as gold-plated toilet seats.
No, they’re digging far deeper, proposing to gut funding meant to help the beloved mascot of the Grand Old Party, the animal that graces the ties and lapel pins of Republicans everywhere: the elephant.
The Asian Elephant Conservation Fund is on the chopping block this week on the Web site for YouCut, a project by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (Va.) that encourages the public to find and eliminate wasteful government expenses.
The Post Most: PoliticsMost-viewed stories, videos and galleries int he past two hours
Loading...
Comments